I am training for the UK IronMan triathlon this July and have started upping my training sessions so that I am cycling every other day. Some people have been telling me that I should look into buying some sort of recovery drink to help with muscle refuelling and repair. Can anyone recommend anything?

Branded recovery drinks are expensive. You're paying for processed, refined products, marketing bullsh*t and limited (if any) advantage over normal foods. If I was going to buy one it would be Torq Recovery because I trust Matt isn't pulling the wool but it's cheaper to buy your own protein powder. Jim Ley has some DIY recipes at http://www.jibbering.com/sports/

What you want immediately after hard exercise is a source of easily digested carbs and protein in a roughly 4:1 ratio. Chocolate milk drink has this and it has been touted as a useful post-workout recovery drink. I use the soya equivalent as I am not a big fan of dairy products.

Apart from that the best thing you can do is eat heathily, with lots of fruit, veg and low-fat sources of protein (eggs, beans and so on), train hard and rest properly. Good luck.

An animal product is any material derived from animals, including meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, dairy products, honey, fur, leather, wool, and silk. Other commonly used animal products are beeswax, bone char, bone china, carmine, casein, cochineal, gelatin, isinglass, lanolin, lard, rennet, shellac, tallow, whey, and yellow grease. Many of these may not be identified in the list of ingredients in the finished product.[18] There is disagreement among groups about the extent to which all animal products, particularly products from insects, must be avoided. The Vegan Society in the UK will only certify a product as vegan if it is free of animal involvement as far as possible and practical; the development and manufacture of vegan products must also not involve animal testing.[19] Neither the Vegan Society nor the American Vegan Society consider the use of honey, silk, or other insect products to be suitable for use, while Vegan Action and Vegan Outreach regard that as a matter of personal choice.[20]

An animal product is any material derived from animals, including meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, dairy products, honey, fur, leather, wool, and silk. Other commonly used animal products are beeswax, bone char, bone china, carmine, casein, cochineal, gelatin, isinglass, lanolin, lard, rennet, shellac, tallow, whey, and yellow grease. Many of these may not be identified in the list of ingredients in the finished product.[18] There is disagreement among groups about the extent to which all animal products, particularly products from insects, must be avoided. The Vegan Society in the UK will only certify a product as vegan if it is free of animal involvement as far as possible and practical; the development and manufacture of vegan products must also not involve animal testing.[19] Neither the Vegan Society nor the American Vegan Society consider the use of honey, silk, or other insect products to be suitable for use, while Vegan Action and Vegan Outreach regard that as a matter of personal choice.[20]

I was under the impression that you don't have to be strictly vegan to participate on these forums. Perhaps I was wrong.

You don't have to be vegan at all to participate. But it's always worth pointing out (in the nicest possible way ) that we can read suggestions/advocacy of animal products in the wider cycling media, and doing so on this forum might be considered somewhat "off topic".

Yeah, chocolate soy milk is excellent as a recovery drink, no need to buy expensive supplements.

Also, although being vegan is not necessary to participate here on VF, the forum is vegan and one of the few rules we have here is that we want to keep it that way as well. This means discussions about non-vegan stuff is kindly asked to be had somewhere other than on VF.